


Long drive, could end in burning flames or paradise

by followbutterfly



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Canon Compliant, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, POV Steve Rogers, Pining Tony Stark, Protective Tony Stark
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-18 02:30:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21920359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/followbutterfly/pseuds/followbutterfly
Summary: Since they moved into the tower, Steve had seen Tony only for three times. He had no clues why the man was trying to avoid him. When he confronted, the outcome turned out to be something he hadn't expected.Set after the Avengers and ended in Iron Man 3
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 2
Kudos: 25





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For Prisca, thank you for taking my question: who's falling in love first, Steve or Tony? to the infinite possibilities and wonderful discussions.
> 
> The title comes from a Taylor Swift's song.

1

Since they moved into the tower, Steve had seen him only for three times.

The first time was the Homecoming (named by Clint, who ridiculously cooed over the idea that they become F.R.I.E.N.D.S., and he wants be Jennifer Aniston, whose name Steve hadn’t dared to ask for the reference out of being made fun of, as the pop culture inept that he was), when all of them gathered in the living room, picked an action movie (with a time traveling robot started to kill a female protagonist, Steve only registered the fact that he had seen a naked man on screen for the first time, so he couldn’t remember the plot, let alone all the weird dialogues in the modern day life), ordered a lot of beer and pizza, also played Mario Kart and some silly so called ‘college game era’ when Clint, Thor and Tony challenged one another to throw some snacks right into the other’s mouth.

The game stayed silly and ludicrous for quite a while, along with Bruce’s chuckles and Natasha’s rolling eyes from time to time, until Clint stepped up with three pieces of food in one shot and aimed all the targets to Tony at once. Tony gleefully accepted the challenge, but being the most ‘ordinary’ man among the other Avengers, he was good at taking a shot, but sadly, not too many shots at once. The result of the ‘silly’ game caused him to choke, and then laugh after Clint rushed to hit his back, and choked his throat with an unintentional hard thud, and Tony swore it left the purple mark on his back and his throat.

He didn’t mention anything about the marks around his shoulders, and his limps, and his legs, which still left hinged after the event in New York. Steve knew about the healing wounds and fractured bones because he’d witnessed Tony in paramedics and had seen how terrible they were.

Right now, Tony just laughed along, drank more beer and started to plot the revenge against Clint. Steve was in a good spirit, so he had to save the lectures for the next time.

2

The second time was two weeks after the Homecoming. The avengers were split into small teams in order to help SHIELD agents and the government clean up the city, and cover up the media with the seemingly reliable narrative of what had happened with alien’s invasion in the center of New York and God of Mischief materialized into a real person. Steve paired up with Natasha (he slipped into calling her Nat, like he always used to call Bucky with a nickname, Buck, and she didn’t seem to mind.) They’d been working to corporate with SHIELD agents for the media press and attended the public meeting. But Steve was the one who appeared on all the overages for weeks.

The media went insane when they knew the real Captain America came back from the death. Natasha worked with the press, scanned all the news, and helped him to adjust his ‘media persona’ for press conference, but never stepped up beside him, or took a public role to still remain her anonymity. Steve was aware of her reasons, but sometimes he was taken aback by all the press vultures, paparazzi and all phones and camera targeting him like guns. The good news is, when he took off Captain America uniform, only a few people recognized him, so he could have some alone time to breathe out.

“I thought you get used to it since the war,” Natasha remarked. Her voice was smooth and emotionless enough, but Steve knew it was her way to show some concern. “You file contains a lot of media press and nation tour, you also went with all the girls, acting like a war hero.”

“Well, I am a war hero,” Steve said, his cockiness earned a smirk and a light punch from her. Then he sighed, taking a water bottle from the fridge and took a huge gulp. “But sometimes they are too much. They don’t regard any privacy and charge me with questions that don’t have anything to do with the Avengers or the fight. They even asked me once I still wear the underwear in the old-fashioned style back in 1942.”

Natasha laughed, her posture seemed more and more relaxing when she was with him, which was a good sign that Steve could be himself with her. She shrugged and said, “you may want Tony to supervise you about all the press junkies. Basically, he was born to be an eye candy for all the news.”

Steve frowned, “I doubt that. I hardly see him these days.”

He could tell that worried Natasha as well, but she hid her emotions better than he did. “He said he wanted to stepped down from the press and volunteered to deal with the UN funding, and even Fury agreed on that.”

“Do you agree with him?” Steve couldn’t help himself to ask.

Natasha turned to look at him straight into the eyes. “It’ll be better for him to have the distance for all of this.”

Steve didn’t say anything but sipped the water in silence. As a team leader, it had him worried that perhaps Tony would want to go on a solo mission or planned to do something brave and reckless without consulting the team. His personality and his impulsive tendency said a lot about that. But as a friend (Steve took another gulp, and pondered about the elusive term of being ‘friend’ with Tony Stark), he wanted Tony to have some privacy. He knew Tony claimed that he hadn’t been a soldier, but Steve was certain that all the flamboyant surface and narcissistic pasty look, that the man must have suffered from the shattered reality.

Besides, And Steve acknowledged that kind of revelation by first hand. He was familiar with the look of a soldier, whose shoulders carried weight and burden when he saw one. The world Tony had been always familiar with, the world he owned with all money, knowledge and power was changed forever.

Natasha smiled when she saw a look on his face. “I can tell that you have a never-ending fight with yourself right now.”

She caught him off guard; either Steve was so easy to read or she became so close to him that she could only read his thoughts was a bit terrifying.

“I have an appointment with him in fifteen minutes. He wants to upgrade my tasers and widow’s bites. You should come down to his workshop if you want to check him out.”

Steve spluttered, “I don’t know Nat, he invites you, not—”

“Don’t be silly,” she said, putting down the glass and walked away from him to the elevator. “I need to collect all the weapons for Tony anyway. See you downstairs.”

3

Tony turned away from the blue prints on screen and his brown eyes met Steve’s about a split of a second before he was blinking and turned away. He regained his signature smirk to Natasha instead.

“Hey, took you long enough to let me have a look at all beautiful weapons of yours.”

Natasha handed him her weapons and Tony, as usual, bragged about all the updates he’d been planning for her with all technical terms. Steve was lingering behind Natasha and took a look at the scattered armors parts, the Chitauri’s weapons which Tony managed to dissect them after the scenes, and Iron Man suit hanging in the middle of the workshop in the process of maintenance.

“You don’t plug the suit in the recharge,” Steve blurted out before he caught himself blushing when Tony stopped talking with Natasha and looked at him.

“With all tech knowledge to back up that statement, I’m impressed that your guess is close to what’s happening to Mark VII,” of course, whom was Steve talking to besides the man with sarcasm dripping with each word?

Tony didn’t seem to flinch when Steve noted that Iron Man was in the status quo, waiting to be repaired, and after all the weeks passed by, Tony hadn’t have the suit repaired; all the scratches, broken parts, and the scarred mask were still here, reminding of what had happened to Iron Man, and to the man inside that suit.

“Why didn’t you repair your suit? It might be an incident you’d want to put—”

“I’m working on the new one called Mark VIII.” Tony interrupted, but for some reason Steve could tell he was straight up lying to him.

They weren’t friends, maybe good colleagues. They were cordial and could be tolerant enough with each other. With Tony’s withdrawal and Steve’s reluctance, they would never be anything more than two people tiptoeing, tasting the water and end up going apart in their own ways. Steve would turn against himself and fought to remain calm, though he knew it would kill him to see his friend, no -- his co-workers, fight the monsters alone in the losing battle.

While Steve was spiraling into the self-pity, it was Natasha who came to the rescue.

“Steve told me he needs his new suit, after the one that Phil had designed.” It was still too painful even to utter the agent’s name. Tony’s face was tensed up, though his shoulders didn’t budge.

“That’s what I can do for you, Cap.” he talked to him, but smiled at Natacha, avoiding to meet Steve’s eyes at all cost, “I can design your new suit on the plane to Milan, it’ll take a couple of weeks to finish, but I’ll make sure it’s gonna be less flashy, and more coolio.” He winked, “the chicks in SHIELD would totally dig it.”  
Steve frowned, “I don’t have to come down here for the measurement?”

“Not at all, I have JARVIS run all your physical data right now as we’re standing here. All the designs are in the process, and I’ll have Jarvis notified you when it’s done.” His smile was all plastered, and Steve hated it.

But he decided to let it go, again. “Good. Thanks, Tony.”

He didn’t catch that the smile was fading right after Steve walked out of the room.

4

He hadn’t seen Tony for two weeks, as the man had said about the business trip, so Steve tried his best not to impose about Tony upon Natasha, to ask her how’s he doing and tried to stop worrying about him, while he couldn’t do nothing about it.

Well, he tried.

When he knew Tony was coming on that night, Steve waited for him. He didn’t just pop out from his room and waited for Tony, he planned to sabotage the other man’s unwavering solitude by plotting with JARVIS. He ordered the AI to warn him when Tony came to the communal space. He had been waiting until Tony was alone in the kitchen.

The man jumped when he heard the sound of footsteps. The reaction confirmed Steve’s assumption, but that didn’t make anything less difficult. He had the uphill mission to do, and he must not let it slip away this time.

“Are you drinking?” Before he knew his voice was a little too harsh, Tony winced and turned his face away from him.

“It’s none of your business, Steve.” Tony spat. He put down the liquor and cursed under his breath, “JARVIS, you sneaky little bastard.”

Tony went back to his whiskey. His face was crumpled, and his wrinkles were deeper. There were dark circles under his eyes, and all his manners screamed tiresome, worse than that, they were loomed with desperation.

Steve suddenly noticed that it was the first time Tony called his name, not just Cap, as he always did.

“I know, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to catch you off guard like that.”

Tony’s gaze was hard and now it fixed on his face, “catch me off guard? I hardly flinch with your manly presence, if that’s what you’re concerned. Now leave me alone.”

“I can’t,” Steve walked towards him, he tried to stay calm. Focus on the mission. “Look, Tony. I know it was hard, but I know what the nightmares feel like. I know what you’ve been going through. A lot of things happen and change after New York. You don’t have to handle it alone. Let me help you.”

Tony scoffed. He’s drunk, Steve consoled himself.

“I don’t want another father figure to order me around, or put me in check, I don’t—” Tony stopped, his eyes were bloodshot, not just from alcohol. “Go to bed, Cap.”

Steve was getting better at knowing Tony’s sign of deflecting, but he was terrible at being anything less than honest.

“And I know what’s falling from the sky feels like. I feel what you’ve been feeling and going through, Tony.”

Tony didn’t say anything, he kept looking at him, just looking straight into Steve’s eyes and staring as though Steve was not human, but something strange and mesmerizing; like a sculpture made of the rare element, and Steve didn’t dare to breathe.

Tony must have been more drunk than Steve had thought, to be fair, he didn’t know what being drunk felt like in his entire life, especially, when it came from a person with impulsive disorders, the effect must have some higher degrees. But at that time Steve wasn’t aware of it, so he didn’t expect Tony to lean in, getting closer, and closer—

Steve suddenly realized that the man’s eyelashes were longer than his, and stained with tears when his face was so close and his cheeks brushing against him.

Steve froze. He couldn’t kiss back or do anything besides sensing, and feeling Tony’s soft lips on his.

It took only a second, when Steve felt the man pulling off from him. The silence broke off, with the sounds of the chair Tony had been sitting on rattled. The man’s face turned pale, apart from his drunkenness. Tony’s eyed were closed to giving a panic attack. He was about to blurt out something, but decided to swallow it down to the throat, as if he wanted to vomit.

Steve was the first one to move, “Tony, it’s—”

“Sorry,” the man interrupted, “I’m just got lost, and misunderstanding something, It’s—never mind. Jesus, sorry, Cap.” He got off from the chair and hurried to the elevator. “G’night.”

Steve was sitting sitting there in the bizarre moment, and realized that it was his first kiss since 1942.

5

Steve didn’t know how to talk to Tony, or how to act around him. Everything was blurred, but in the meantime, was also like the bright light flashing into his eyes in the moment when Tony leaned down and brushing his lips against his. Metaphorically, it was the briefest, but also the longest moment, because Steve could remember every microsecond when it happened, but also couldn’t believe what just had happened to him, and without any contexts, he couldn’t find the reasons why it did happen. Why did Tony kiss him?

“Couldn’t sleep?” Natasha greeted him in the morning, and Steve only grunted back, which caused the notorious raising eyebrows from Clint.

“Wow, Captain America just acted out so rudely for the first time, lady and gents.”

Steve just rolled eyes at him, “nice try, Clint.”

Natasha observed his movements, but for some reasons, decided not to push her agenda more than that. They had breakfast in comfortable silence, as Steve’s mind was whirling like the nearly broken machine.

Weeks later, Thor came back from Asgard after the Ether incident which cost Loki’s life. The sacrifice of God of Mischief seemed to redeem his crimes in the earth, for now. Everyone tried not to remind Thor about his brother’s death. Clint had proposed the idea of the party (again) to cheer him up and wanted to lift up team spirits, and no one had a strong objection to his idea, even Fury, Maria and some SHIELD agents were invited.

6

The rooms were packed with people, Steve were were familiar with many of them whose missions are Avengers related. Everyone gathered in the spacious living room, drinking, and catching up with one another. Rhodey and Pepper were the only people who weren’t Avengers or SHIELD agents that had been invited. Steve was introduced to them by Fury, and for the first time, he knew from Pepper that she and Tony had broken up the few weeks ago, but still remained good friends and business partners. The break up had happened before the incident just a couple days ago, and Steve weren’t sure how to feel about it.

Tony came to the party two hours late in the Armani suit, as he’d said: tangled up with the SI work to be done, and no one blamed him after he mingled with everyone and easily became the center of the party (besides Thor, whose moods were lifted up by Asgardian alcohol, that Steve assumed contains a lot of Ethanol). He told jokes, flirted with both males and females, flirted with Pepper, which made the other roll eyes fondly at him, and also smiled a lot.

Except that he didn’t so all those things with Steve, or came to him, or even laid an eye on him.

Steve was anything but a coward. He knew Tony had been avoiding him, and knew that it was so childish but reasonable reflex after that awkward night. Still, it had worried him for weeks because A) if Tony had neither acted normally, nor treated it like a joke (or a cruel joke to taste the limit of Steve’s outdated gender’s view, who knows), it would have been much easier to clear the air between them and B) it was a worrying sign to something going on inside Tony’s head, something Steve hadn’t dared to ask.

He was not a coward, but a man was allowed to fear, right? Steve thought miserably.

But all he could do was taking an action. He decided to face the fear, rather than to be left out or ignored by Tony as some unjust punishment. He wouldn’t tolerate with that.

So, he waited until the party nearly ended, with only one glass of wine in his hand. It was around midnight and all the guests started to leave, waving him goodbyes and wishing him luck with the trip to D.C. in the next few days. Steve knew this time was his only chance to talk to Tony, and he was not called the team strategist for nothing.

When the man excused himself and left the last few groups of the guests, Steve pretended not to rush to catch the sight of him in the front of elevator. His heart skipped with a beat when Tony noticed him, then all the air was sucked out of his lungs as he saw the shocked expression exhibited on the other man’s face.

“Hi, Steve, good to see your enjoy the night but I’m about to leave, so—” Tony was so frigid, his fingers started playing with his tie frantically. But Steve knew him well enough to ignore the excuses. He forced his voice to be calm and patient.

“I want to ask you about what happened that night.”

Tony looked at him. For a moment Steve saw a glimpse of vulnerability; so precious, and so rare, like a diamond in the rough. After that, it was gone, far from the visibility and plastered with a small shallow smile.

“Look, buddy. I’m sorry, I know that it might have confused your preference a bit, because this” he gestured at himself, and smiled smugly, “can attract to all the gender spectrums.”

Steve frowned, “what do you mean?”

The smile wasn’t wavering from his face as Tony said, “it means that I was just being spontaneous. As you already knew, I broke up with Pepper and came home drunk the fuck out, and you just happened to be there.”

Steve looked at Tony, stood still and was so dumbfounded. Even though the answer was clear but something wasn’t right. His brain was searching wildly, trying to detect some fallacy in the excuse, as if his gut feelings knew it was an excuse, not the truth.

Goddamn it, but what did he expect?

“Then why didn’t you just tell me instead of avoiding me for weeks?”

“Well, in case you didn’t notice, I’m quite a busy man. Do you think I have only the Avengers business to take care of? I have more armor upgrades, AI and inventions for SI, I don’t have time to talk my heart out to you. My fault, I know.” Tony pointed at himself, and shrugged, “I should’ve let you know it was no big deal.”

Steve didn’t know what to say. It wasn’t a surprising outcome, not that he hadn’t thought Tony wouldn’t say something like this, but—

But then Tony interrupted his train of thoughts, “but what did you expect, Cap? That I have a feeling for you out of sudden?” His arrogant posture since Steve saw him on the helicarrier finally came back in full term.

“I thought that you just kissed me to deflect the nightmares you’ve been going through,” Steve lied.

“I get that you don’t want to talk about it but I hope that you can talk those difficult things to me, because I’m the one who suffers from the same condition. I wanted to apologize for calling you selfish, as you did the opposite of what you’ve believed yourself to be. You’re so much more than just a man in the suit, or a billionaire playboy, Tony. I saw that with my own eyes, and I trust your actions more than your words, and I’d like to do such that from now on, as we are in the team.”

Tony looked so sheepishly taken aback. But for Steve, even lying about the reasons to expect something from the man, he realized that he had just said the sincerest confession about Tony in front of the man himself, with all the fuss and the mess he had made, Steve felt embarrassed at himself.

“um, thank you, I guess.” Tony touched his neck, looking nervous. He looked smaller; a little bit younger. Steve could’ve sworn it almost looked like Tony was blushing as well.

“So, that means we’re cool, right?” Steve asked.

The other man stared at him. Then gave a small smile, which was more sincere, but not brightly either. “Yes, yes, of course, Cap.”

They parted ways in the elevator. Before he left, Steve informed Tony about the mission in D.C., said that he was about to stay there for a few days. Tony had the new suit ready for him to taste the next day. They were talking about its new functions (“a stealth suit that SHIELD hadn’t thought of,” Tony claimed), as they nodded and smiled at each other. Steve could feel like everything was almost as the same as it had been.

Until he went to Triskelion, happened to know all about what SHIELD was planning to do, exposing HYDRA’s schemes, and realized that Bucky had come back to life.

Then, all his thoughts about Tony kissing him was gone, replaced by the smell of blood, the metal arm, the pain, the hurt look of his best friend, and the last thought was his body being so heavy as it was drowning into the bottom of the sea.


	2. Chapter 2

1

Steve woke up with the soft, caressing voice of Marvin Gay. His eyes were adjudging with the hospital room’s neon light, while in the periphery, he saw Sam was coming to him.

“Good to know that your bedhead makes you look less perfect,” the other man commented. Steve snorted. Still, he couldn’t bare to open his eyes, the eye lids were too heavy, the vision was blurred. Suddenly, he felt pain happened all over his body. Even from the slight laughter at Sam made everything hurt ten times.

“Go to sleep, Cap.” Sam said, and Steve couldn’t have any objections to that. The last thought before drifting into the dreamless blackout was the nickname ‘Cap’ that Sam used, which reminded Steve of someone important to him, but that person seemed so far away. All Steve could do was tugging the familiar memory close to his mind and heart, but couldn’t seem to figure out anything yet.

His eyes were closed, and he slept for other two days.

2

Sam was his babysitter, apart from watching Steve being unconscious for twenty hours a day, he occasionally went to buy some snacks and coffee from the shops nearby because he couldn’t tolerate the drinks from the vending machine.

From time to time, Steve had Natasha looked after him (more like glaring at him with the murderous smile), but she couldn’t stay long. Her secret spy identity was blown up. Her face was all over the news, as much as she was brilliant at being in the stealth mode, she was being tracked down and followed by all the press.

“Our jobs have been reversed; you were always the one behind the curtain.” Steve, despite the bitterness and the pain, managed to tease to his old friend.

Natasha smirked. “It mustn’t be that long. Captain America can’t stay dead forever. The world will find you no matter what.” She poked her finger to his left arm, which was still connected an IV bag. “Besides, you’re far from death. The serum’s working so far.”

Steve groaned at that, “a month, Nat. The doctor said I can be back from a month.”

“Don’t be such a baby, you’ve been frozen in the ice for seventy years.” She hit his chest lightly, but Steve yelped in pain. She gave him her signature menacing smile.

“I have to go under radar from now on; stay with Fury and other agents, and clean up some SHIELD documents,” she told him as the matter-of-factly. “I’ll stay in touch.”  
Steve was silent. He watched her packing some clothes and weapons. She changed her clothes into more casual civilian outfit; the grey hoodie and ripped jeans without make-up. With a backpack clung on her shoulders, she looked more like a college student struggling with the final exams rather than a trained spy assassin.

“You should tell Stark,” her voice pierced through the silence out of nowhere.

Steve was startled, “what?”

“The file we saw in the New Jersey. His parents and Bucky. You should tell him before everything’s too late.”

Steve didn’t say anything, as if the heavy lump blocked his throat, and he couldn’t speak. Somehow, Nat always knew.

Steve could pretend he was too focused on the pain and started to slip into the drowsiness again, so that he could say he didn’t hear her emotionless tone, and didn’t see her unreadable, yet omnipotent expression.

“You know, after Bucky pulled you out of the water. We couldn’t have found you. We thought you had been drowning so we were focused on the river for a while, until Stark gave us the GPS. Then we could see you lying on the bank, bleeding to death with all broken limps and the bullet holes. It’s the matter of time that you might be dead, and we wouldn’t have found you in time.”

He swallowed, he couldn’t be able breathe and he knew too well it didn’t come from pain. “I haven’t seen him since I woke up. I didn’t know that.”

Natasha smiled. “I said he was a genius, but didn’t say he wasn’t an idiot.”

And before he could respond to her words, she swung the door opened and left without saying goodbye.

3

That night Steve had a series of nightmares. Most of them were about drowning and sinking, mixed with guilt about Bucky, whom he couldn’t save, even he tried the hardest. The man disappeared into the darkness. It was his fault; letting go of Bucky on the train, watching him scream in shock, looking into his eyes and only saw the betrayal in the reflection. The man had been suffering because of him. In the dreams, Bucky screamed in pain, as he was cursing Steve with the most despicable words he’s ever hard, spitting on his face, calling out his name. ‘After all I’ve done to you, you still betrayed me, Stevie. How could you?’

Steve woke up with the streak of tears strained on his face and the hospital’s pillow. Suddenly he felt all the horrible pain running through his bones, the spine seemed paralyzed; because he couldn’t move his body. He couldn’t get out of the bed and all he could do was crying, shouting some incomprehensible words and Bucky’s name. He felt like was drowning into the bed, sinking like he was on that plane again.

In the darkroom, he saw someone moving fast. He heard a voice; a low one, unlike Sam, called the doctor and during the shattered vision, overwhelmed by fear, pain and panic, he heard someone’s calling his name, over and over.

The figure with a white gown, must be a doctor, Steve’s mind supplied that, approached him and injected something in his arm. He was sniffling, begging for the pain to stop and still calling out for Bucky as the pain dwindled.

He couldn’t move, but at least the pain stopped. In fact, his body turned from pain to numbness. The drug, Steve’s mind found the answer clumsily. And suddenly his consciousness was switched off, and all he could see was the total darkness.

4

“This is sick,” Sam burst out on the fifth day since Steve had the nightmare. “I’m so tired of this.”

“Feel free to leave anytime,” Steve said. He was mildly aware of his helplessness that it certainly caused a lot of discomfort to his friend, even then; he was surprised that Sam was so patient with keeping him company for so long, despite their short-term friendship.

“No, I didn’t mean you. I mean him.” Even using his hands, Steve couldn’t quite understand what Sam was trying to say.

“Ugh, never mind. I won’t do what he tells me to do again. This is beyond hilarious. It’s absurd.” Sam continued rambling and acted as though Steve wasn’t in the room.

“Are you alright?”

“I’m perfectly fine, as far as the pining is over.”

Steve was about to ask him, when the other scribbled furiously on the note and told Steve he was leaving the note to the nurse. After a minute, Sam came back in the room, smiling. “Everything’s fine. It’s the hospital stuff.”

Steve knew he lied, but he was certain that Sam was too reliable to cause any harm. They changed the subject. Sam asked his about the plan after the discharge and Steve, without hesitation, told him that he must find Bucky.

Sam didn’t even budge when he said he was willing to go on the search with him. He also promised he would use his military resources in order to collect all the data about the winter soldier.

Steve couldn’t be more grateful. His mind started to count down on the final day on the bed.

5

He slept sound, thanks to the painkiller, and woke up to find a new visitor sitting on the sofa, purposely as far as from the hospital bed.

“Hi, Tony.”

The man waved awkwardly at him. He pretended to fiddle on his phone for a while before he slowly tiptoed towards Steve, hesitant.

“Hey, Cap.”

It was uncomfortable, yet amusing seeing Tony Stark could frigid. His shoulders, the jaws’ muscles were tensed up. His posture was totally a mess. His brown eyes were searching all over the room but Steve. It was too difficult to behold the rarest occasion and Steve was drinking in it.

“You come so early,” Steve tried to break the ice, he tried.

Tony looked even more disturbed, in fact; he seemed close to freak out. “About that. Actually, um, I came here as your friend, what’s his name? oh right Sam.” He choked, and seemed to pay attention on the sheets, instead of looking at Steve. “Right, your bird friend told me he needed to go back to help his veteran folks in the therapeutic meetings, so he asks me to cover this nanny’s jobs.”

Steve felt both slightly offended and intrigued. He raised his eyebrows as a challenge. “I don’t need to be looked after. You don’t have to keep me company if you don’t want to.”

Tony was literally vibrating something like a panic attack, but he managed to say, “that can’t do. The Bird Man would totally kick my ass if I leave off the duty. He had me promised to spoon feed you all the snacks. With serum, you have pretty fast metabolism. He said you can swallow a chunk of chocolate without getting fat. And I plan to make a bet against it, tasting the limits. For science.”

Steve was trying his best not to laugh, “so your plan was making me a human Foie Gras? That’s so brutal, even from you, Tony.”

“Hey!” The man made an accused face. “Don’t give me any of your sass. I’m the one who can legitimately make a snarky comment.”

It was too precious not to see the expressions on Tony’s face changed. He looked more upfront, but much more relaxed. He actually pouted at Steve’s remark, which was even more terrific.

Steve could tell that Tony was lying to him about Sam, and if he put their poorly-made accuses all together, he might get the reasons why Tony Stark was standing awkwardly beside his bed after all.

Steve didn’t ask Tony about the reasons, even if he could. For now he was just glad that Tony was there with him.

It was a comfort in the bearable awkward silence that Steve wouldn’t even mind at all.

6

Tony seemed to determine to remain silent. He was absorbing into his phone and Starkpad (“I’m not a CEO, but I’m also the engineering scientists and a shareholder, duh.”) Instead of running to buy some snacks like Sam, Tony ordered a lot of food, desserts and refreshments. Steve, right then could sit on the bed on his own, with the healing spine and less fractured legs (“I don’t mind making the prosthetic legs for Captain America though,” Tony implied) wasn’t permitted to eat certain food, but Tony gave him a cheeseburger anyway.

They passed a couple of days just like that: in silence and harmony, like they’d been so used to each other’s presence. Steve was given book, something modern and more popular fictions to kill the boredom, while Tony changed the 70s music to more upbeat songs. The sound of drumming and guitar solos had been playing, and from time to time, he could hear it through Tony’s headphones.

Something shifted between them. The tension before the mission in DC had been frizzled out. Tony didn’t bring back the old issue, and Steve didn’t press it, as they were drifting and floating in the bubbled area; in the square white room, barren from all personal belongings and detached from the reality.

One night, Steve heard Tony making a strangled noise in the dark at late night on the sofa. He knew the other had been suffering from nightmares. The man was groaning, while his body continued jerking. Tony was shivering as if he was cold, but Steve could see he was sweating all over.

He called out Tony in the dark, trying to wake him up. Suddenly the memories were flashed back to the last week when Steve heard a voice calling his name, shaking him from the worst nightmares possible. It was him. Tony was there with him that night.

“Tony, wake up. Tony.”

The figure was trembling, and Steve could feel the trepidation of how Tony had been fighting his own demons and it was painful to see, even he’d undergone the same experience not long time ago.

Tony, please wake up. His mind was screaming, he kicked the bed, attempting to break free from his entrapped body, and push the emergency button beside his bed. He heard the muffled voices and fainting footsteps approaching. In no time, he could sense the doctor pushing the door open.

Steve had managed to give out his last energy to point out at Tony on the sofa. “Him. Please, help him,” he said before the drug dragged him into the same old darkness, and in a second he was blacked out.

7

Now Steve could imagine what Bucky felt like, caged in Cryostasis chamber, and unfrozen in order to kill. His body wasn’t his own anymore and he hated it, and started to hate himself because of it. The conditions reminded Steve of the time before the serum. When he had spent all of his life trying to prove what he could do but his existence served nothing, but the sense of helplessness.

“They said the nightmares I had delayed the treatment.” Steve informed Tony. The man listened to him, not even flinched. The reaction was proven Steve’s prediction was right: Tony had been monitoring him for the whole time. “I want to get out of this and find him.”

Tony scoffed, his eyes focusing on the screen and laptop while talking to, “he has nowhere to be found.”

“How do you-”

“I’ve been tracking him with all the satellites and radars. The man doesn’t show his tail unless he wants to. I guess he wants some time alone, you know. Some little space and fresh air to figure things out.” Tony wasn’t even looking up. “Don’t worry, Cap. I’m pretty sure your boyfriend would show up when he’s more like his old self.”

“Hydra would’ve had him by now,”

“Natasha and Fury are working on that. They have eyes everywhere. As far as I know; there’s no longer Hydra heads who haven’t been uprooted. Some were the agent living in Switzerland, but hardly in active.”

Steve averted his eyes from Tony, for he didn’t want the other saw the tears in his eyes. “I hate this.”

He was just bursting to himself, mostly. The pain hadn’t gone away and he always knew it never faded for the rest of his life.

In the vicinity, Steve felt Tony shifting from the sofa. His body was tensed when he felt Tony eyeing on him. He imagined Tony’s eyes staring at his back, and his body shivered but he didn’t turn back.

“I’m sorry about him, Cap.” Tony’s voice was low, like a whisper. “I’m sorry for what they’ve done to him.”

Steve forced himself to shut his eye, tell him before it’s too late, he heard Natasha’s voice ringing in his ears, but decided to brush it off in the last minute before he drifted off.

8

The last two weeks had been hell, but Steve had become more immune to all the needles, drugs and painkillers. He could stand up and walk, even it took him an amount of time longer than the doctor and the therapist had expected. They said his body had already been healed, surely nor did they mention his mind whether it was, but Steve couldn’t care less about himself.

He decided to leave in the next four days. Tony had been away for ‘the businesses’ on the day and came back in the late night, sitting on the sofa and continued working. They talked, and bantered in the good mood but in more casual way. Steve could sense that Tony was keeping some distance from him since Steve’s break down that day. It was kind of the déjà vu, similar to what had happened in the Tower.

Steve was required to take the physical therapy sessions, so Tony didn’t stay with him all the time as the past few weeks. He was also able to do some basic exercises, and certain that he could be back on duty in no time.

Steve was so relieved, thinking about being no longer the baggage of everyone’s business made him more vivacious. He regained more strength, and felt his body had more agility. He promised himself the first thing he would do after coming home was to hit the gym and punch all the sand bags until his body gave out all the energy.

He was almost right about his predictions unless the last two nights he had the nightmares about Bucky screaming in pain as he was falling from the train again.

Steve woke up and felt his throat was constricted. He felt it was dry and sored, badly. His back was wet from the sweating and his limbs looked like they were glued with the bed. He was unable to move. He tried to get out of bed, then felt his right hand was squeezed, holding him back.

Tony was staring at him with intense. His brown eyes, gleaming in the dim light of the early morning, were fixed at him, even without blinking. With the solid and gratifying expression only could move the mountain, and Steve didn’t even dare to breathe. He recalled it back then, it was the same eyes when they were up close. When Tony had chosen to close the gap between them, as his lips were moving and pressing Steve’s.

At the moment, Steve exactly realized that the kiss wasn’t unintentional as the man said at all. The kiss was for him. Once the desire was resurfaced, Steve recognized it instantly, Tony wouldn’t be able to deny it no matter what.

Except this time Tony wasn’t about to kiss him. He was just holding his hand, brushing his thumb with the back of his hand, as if soothing him.

Steve felt like he was crying, and once he did want that, he couldn’t stop the tears from falling.

It was so spontaneous. He was crying for everything that was collapsed: his life-long relationship with Bucky, his loneliness in the present where he always felt out of place, the melancholia and the yearning to the past that transformed itself into his nightmares. All good and precious things he was about to achieve and dreamed about in the past were crippling and worthless, compared to the huge burden he was about to do in the present.

When he came to think that his future was now his present. The sense of time reversing suddenly caught him off guard, and at the same time; it was the revelation.

As he was crying, Tony was talking to him in a low voice, consoling him. Mostly he was speaking to him, “it’s okay, Steve.” He said it over and over.

Steve lost the sense of time, but he could feel his body had been aching and his eyes were swollen. Tony was still looking at him without moving.

Then Steve asked, “how could you find me when I was in the river?”

Even in the dawn with so little light, Steve could see Tony’s wavering eyes. Tony might have sensed that either Natasha or He seemed so hesitant, but started to speak, slowly.

“Well, the SHIELD suit I’ve designed for you has GPS installation. I thought I would still keep tracks on you, Fury’s order.” Tony frigid. “But you changed into the old one to the last mission. At first I thought I was losing you during the flight. On the herricarrier with Bucky, I mean—”

Steve didn’t say anything but looked at the man. His voice was a bit shaking, suddenly he remembered that Tony hated the confrontation, especially when the emotions shared, and conversed. Then, he gripped the hand Tony was holding him, and entwined his and Tony’s together.

He felt Tony’s breath was caught. Then the man let out a small strangled sound, and continued talking.

“I panicked. I used the satellites to search for the life signal, but with all the casualties and bodies I wouldn’t be able to identify you immediately. It took me long enough to find you, and Natasha.”

“I’m sorry that I make you worried,”

Tony scoffed, “I own you, Cap. But it would be nice for you to yell at me less, when the next time I’m risking my life for the mission.”

Steve laughed at that. “Come here, Tony.”

“Um, I’m right here.”

“I mean here, in the bed with me.” Steve moved his body and made the space beside him. “It’s big enough, and I know you haven’t slept since my nightmare.”

He tried to calm his nerves, making it as casual as possible, but couldn’t help when Tony actually complied to his words. He was smaller than Steve, so when he climbed onto the bed there was still some space left between them, so Steve could put his arm around him, while their hands were still holding.

“It’ll get sticky, my hands were already soaking.” Tony said, trembling a little. Steve could feel his body was vibrating with nervousness.

“I won’t mind.” Steve insisted, with a beat, he leaned in and kissed Tony.

It was a slow, but more firmed one. Their lips just pressed with the other. Tony’s body froze, but eventually, he was more relaxed. He opened his lips and took Steve in.

Lying in the small hospital bed together was far from perfect when it came to making out, but they managed. Tony squirmed while Steve was moving to kiss his jaw, down to his neck. “God, Steve.” The man was exasperated. His voice was unsteady, and sounded out of breath, but he didn’t tell Steve to stop.

They were kissing for a while, then Steve pulled out to look at Tony in the eyes. “Just want you to know that I didn’t kiss you because you saved me. I did it because I want to. You care about me, and I’m sorry it takes me long enough to realize it.”

Tony didn’t say anything, but he looked at Steve with wide eyes.

“And just to be clear,” Steve was rubbing his hand on Tony’s goatee, his eyes dancing with amusement. “Bucky isn’t my boyfriend.”

Tony burst out a laughter. He laughed and laughed. Hid body bent and the bed was shaking with the two grown up men laughing together.

9

Steve came back to the Tower, and never felt more alive. After unpacking his bag and wandered around his floor, drinking in what should be called freedom. Tony waited for him to get a proper shower and did some exercises as the doctor required, before he turned up and led Steve down to his workshop to show him all the tracking systems, which he had been developing after the past month.

“I’ve heard from Natasha,” Tony continued, “about the base in New Jersey. I know it’s got blown up by Hydra, but we should check it out? Zola can’t install the underground conspiracy HYDRA base camp just for you to find out. He must have planted them all over the country, or even the overseas. My money is on Russia, probably Siberia, you know, or somewhere communism-friendly if you were the sneaky evil bastard. China must be an option, but I doubt that even in the cold war, the Chinese wouldn’t have welcomed the foreigners, with all Opium War against Western at that time.”

“You think Bucky would go there?” Steve asked.

Tony shrugged, “he isn’t in the states. I’m sure I would’ve found something if he’d still stayed in within range. He got de-brainwashed because he practically saved your life from drowning, so he must try to reset his brain system, adjusting his ‘new’ self and tracks down the Hydra locations he still remembered.”

Steve was silent, but his mind was whirling. “He must have visited New Jersey, but couldn’t find anything. So, he’s out of the country by now.”

“Exactly,” Tony was typing quickly and some locations popped up, most of them are in Eastern Europe. “Natasha sent me these locations and I’m doing some researches; checking up whether all these places smell like Hydra’s piss. We would pinpoint some two or three places in a couple weeks.”

Tony looked up from the screen to smiled at him and Steve’s stomach flipped. The smile on Tony’s face was beautiful and full of hope.

And Steve decided that he couldn’t do something like this to Tony anymore.

I’m going to tell him. He texted Natasha that night. As he was holding a phone in his hand, he started to write a letter to Tony. He finished it at 2 am. in morning and started to pack some necessaries into the bag. He texted Sam to tell what he’s going to do, that he needs some place to crash in.

Steve knew that Tony was still awake in his workshop, tinkering his armors after the status quo in the hospital with Steve, or maybe writing codes or hacking the Russian satellites, (“Go to sleep, Cap. Let the professional handles this,” the man shooed him after Steve offered to help and brought him coffee). Thinking about Tony doing all of this, even it was Superheroes’ business, was the fondest memories he decided to ingrain in his mind forever.

Steve ended the letter with the word ‘love’ and he didn’t regret writing it down.

10

Steve left without telling him. He caught the first flight to DC to stay in Sam’s place. He hadn’t checked the phone until he landed. The first text he’d got was from Natasha.

Tony moved back to Malibu. He sent me the locations he’s been working on. Are you alright?

His heart ached, but Steve reminded himself it was for the best. He didn’t expect Tony to linger in New York, after all he’s told him, but he was surprised that Tony bothered to send the locations to Natasha. Christ, Steve wanted to punch something, anything that could relieve the lump in his chest.

I’m okay. Please keep an eye on him.

Natasha responded with a short reply, and Steve knew that there were many unspoken words and questions underneath, but he hasn’t had a heart to tell her yet.

11

They managed to shut down the Hydra base in Siberia. He discovered the other Winter Soldiers in the Cryostasis, already dead, and suspected that Bucky eliminated them all.

Fury lent them a jet, so they could fly across the countries to find a clue for Bucky and also tracked down the world criminals. They pissed off many other underground war lords, some of them were Hydra or used to be.

We look like nomads, except for Nat. I can’t believe she wasn’t born to look like a homeless. Sam had told him one day. Steve chuckled at that thought. Though he found that was merely a comment meant for a joke, he started to change his look; growing beard and dyed his uniform into darker and less patriotic one. They also went under the name ‘nomad’, to hide under spotlights and the U.S. army.

After almost four months under the radar, Steve was about to arrive in Romania, where he’d heard from Sharon, was the last location CIA had spotted someone looked like Bucky, when Natasha got the call from Fury.

“Steve,” she handed him the phone, her face looked impassionate, but her voice was a bit alarmed, trembling with something Steve recalled as fear. When he picked up the phone, Fury wasted no time to even greet him.

“Tony’s mansion in Malibu got blown up by some terrorists called Mandarin,” Fury’s stern voice was piercing the coldness into his heart. “He's nowhere to be found.”


End file.
